Elmer Bernstein

 

[1922 - 2004] One of the greats of music in American cinema, Elmer Bernstein was one of the talents that contributed to the introduction of the jazz music scene in the film scene. Graduated as a pianist, later studied composition. Serving in World War II, he joined the Army Air Corps Band Glenn Miller, where he made arrangements and compositions.

 

After a quick passage on the radio, did music to B movies like Boots Malone (1951), and “classics” of trash like Robot Monster (1953) and Cat Women of the Moon (1954). His breakthrough came when Victor Young, unable to work in the music of The Ten Commandments (1956) for health reasons, suggest the young Bernstein as a substitute. In the same year he would make the anthological music for The Man With the Golden Arm (The Man with the Golden Arm). Following, would make a remarkable series of soundtracks both in the jazz idiom as the symphonic tradition: Sweet Smell of Success (1957), Birdman of Alcatraz (1962), To Kill a Mockingbird (1962), The Great Scape (1963), The Carpetbaggers (1964), Hawaii (1966), and The Bridge of Remagen (1969).

His successful music for The Magnificent Seven (1960) made him one of the great composers of the American western. In this genre, would came The Comancheros (1961), The Scalphunters (1968), True Grit (1969), Big Jake (1971) and The Shootist (1976), in the follow-ups to Magnificent Seven. Even with the honorable curriculum and professional stability, Bernstein refused to complacency, accepting works unusual for a composer of his stature as the animations Heavy Metal (1981), The Black Cauldron (1985) and independent films such as My Left Foot (1989). A productive partnership with director Martin Scorsese were set on Cape Fear (1991), Age of Innocence (1993) and Bringing Out the Dead (1999). With the remarkable music for drama Far From Heaven (2002), Bernstein revisited classic models of the American Golden Age, in a work detachable as one of his finest moments.